You can see how, before we even get to the arguments, just the attitude on display here is likely to provoke irritation, because it is condescending and smug. When Yglesias writes of the “socialist niece who posts obsessively about Genocide Joe,” he is not taking seriously the possibility that this woman could be correct: that she has been persuaded by the International Court of Justice filings showing evidence that Israel is engaged in genocide and posts “obsessively” because she sees genocide as morally urgent. Instead, there is an implication that this person is somehow mentally unwell. Indeed, Yglesias’s reaction to seeing a poem about the Gaza genocide is that it shows the “increasingly porous boundaries between mental illness and leftwing politics.” Setting aside the question of whether Yglesias is persuaded by the ICJ case against Israel, this is the attitude of an asshole.
We should show the same level of respect for the opinions of Matt Yglesias and his ilk that he shows for the “socialist niece who posts obsessively about Genocide Joe,” that is to say, none at all.
Lord save me from pompous beltway opinion columnists. I used to think he was just regular stupid until he popped off with that "there should be a billion Americans" thing and I realized it was much worse. This guy doesn't even understand how the system he defends works. Yet he defends it endlessly. He's not the kind of ice blooded psychopath that thinks the horror show of empire is good. He's not the regretful pragmatist who thinks we're doing the lesser of two evils. He's just a vibes based naive dipshit who thinks it's good because he thinks it's good. That's all it took. Just some oroborous of self delusion. Paying him to be a shill was all it took to convince him he was doing the right thing.